Upset nursing student threatens to blow up St. Vincent's

Daniel Tepfer

Updated 12:39 pm, Thursday, February 28, 2013

Theresa Burden was charged with four counts of first-degree threatening, after she sent a series of threatening letters, some containing a dangerous-looking substance to St. Vincent’s Medical Center in Bridgeport, Conn. in Dec. 2012, police said.
Photo: Bridgeport Police, Bridgeport Police

BRIDGEPORT -- A nursing student, upset because she was left off the invitation list to a classmate's wedding, threatened to blow up St. Vincent's Medical Center, police said.

Theresa Burden, 37, of Sachem Drive, was charged with four counts of first-degree threatening, after she sent a series of threatening letters -- some containing a dangerous-looking substance -- to the hospital, police said.

Police said on Dec. 20, Burden first sent a letter to the hospital's nursing school under the name of another female student. The letter threatened to blow up the school because it was interfering with the student's wedding plans.

The student whose name was on the letter was subsequently suspended from the school. However, police said they later determined she had not written the letter.

In the following weeks, police said several more letters arrived at the hospital signed with the names of female nursing students.

One contained a green, granular substance and stated: "I will blow up St. Vincent's."

Another claimed: "I put explosives on the first floor."

A third held a white swab and stated: "Get some MRSA and die."

Police detectives rounded up all the nursing students and began taking handwriting samples from them to compare to the letters.

When police got to Burden, they said she became visibly upset and confessed to detectives that she had sent the letters. The green substance turned out to be cat litter from her home.